Storage recovery from total cache loss using journal-based replication

ABSTRACT

In one aspect, a method includes receiving write I/Os for storage in a primary storage array, splitting the write I/Os to a replica site, storing the write I/Os for storage in the storage array in a cache, periodically de-staging the write I/Os in the cache to a volume and after a cache data loss, restoring lost write I/Os from the cache by using the write I/Os split to the replica site.

BACKGROUND

Computer data is vital to today's organizations and a significant part of protection against disasters is focused on data protection. As solid-state memory has advanced to the point where cost of memory has become a relatively insignificant factor, organizations can afford to operate with systems that store and process terabytes of data.

Conventional data protection systems include tape backup drives, for storing organizational production site data on a periodic basis. Another conventional data protection system uses data replication, by creating a copy of production site data of an organization on a secondary backup storage system, and updating the backup with changes. The backup storage system may be situated in the same physical location as the production storage system, or in a physically remote location. Data replication systems generally operate either at the application level, at the file system level, or at the data block level.

SUMMARY

In one aspect, a method includes receiving write I/Os for storage in a primary storage array, splitting the write I/Os to a replica site, storing the write I/Os for storage in the storage array in a cache, periodically de-staging the write I/Os in the cache to a volume and after a cache data loss, restoring lost write I/Os from the cache by using the write I/Os split to the replica site.

In another aspect, an apparatus includes electronic hardware circuitry configured to receive write I/Os for storage in a primary storage array, split the write I/Os to a replica site, store the write I/Os for storage in the storage array in a cache, periodically de stage the write I/Os in the cache to a volume and, after a cache data loss, restore lost write I/Os from the cache by using the write I/Os split to the replica site. The circuitry includes at least one of a processor, a memory, a programmable logic device or a logic gate.

In a further aspect, an article includes a non-transitory computer-readable medium that stores computer-executable instructions. The instructions cause a machine to receive write I/Os for storage in a primary storage array, split the write I/Os to a replica site, store the write I/Os for storage in the storage array in a cache, periodically de-stage the write I/Os in the cache to a volume and after a cache data loss, restore lost write I/Os from the cache by using the write I/Os split to the replica site.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an example of a data protection system used with a continuous replication mode.

FIG. 2 is an illustration of an example of a journal history of write transactions for a storage system.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of an example of a data protection system used to facilitate cache recover.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of an example of a process to handle write I/Os is a process 400.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of an example of a process to recover I/O data after a cache failure is a process 500.

FIG. 6 is a computer on which any of the processes of FIGS. 4 and 5 may be implemented.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Described herein is an approach to recover a storage array after a total cache loss using a journal-based data protection system.

While cache loss event are rare events since cache is mirrored and there is not a single point of failure in modern storage systems, cache losses may still happen. Even if there is a synchronous replica at of the storage and no data is really lost, the recovery process is very long and requires reading all the data of the replica storage.

Using the approach herein, a storage array can be recovered to a consistent state very close to what its state was prior to the total cache loss, without a need to read the whole replica storage, but rather reading an area which is proportional to the cache size of the system. In one particular example, with synchronous replication, no data will be lost at all, and even with asynchronous replication if continuous replication was on and there was not any replication downtime during the cache loss, all the data can be flushed to the replica site and no data will be lost. Recovery of the storage array volumes is quick and efficient, because there is no need to re-apply data that already exists in the storage array.

The following definitions may be useful in understanding the specification and claims.

BACKUP SITE—a facility where replicated production site data is stored; the backup site may be located in a remote site or at the same location as the production site;

BOOKMARK—a bookmark is metadata information stored in a replication journal which indicates a point in time.

DATA PROTECTION APPLIANCE (DPA)—a computer or a cluster of computers responsible for data protection services including inter alia data replication of a storage system, and journaling of I/O requests issued by a host computer to the storage system;

HOST—at least one computer or networks of computers that run at least one data processing application that issues I/O requests to one or more storage systems; a host is an initiator with a SAN;

HOST DEVICE—an internal interface in a host, to a logical storage unit;

IMAGE—a copy of a logical storage unit at a specific point in time;

INITIATOR—a node in a SAN that issues I/O requests;

I/O REQUEST—an input/output request (sometimes referred to as an I/O), which may be a read I/O request (sometimes referred to as a read request or a read) or a write I/O request (sometimes referred to as a write request or a write);

JOURNAL—a record of write transactions issued to a storage system; used to maintain a duplicate storage system, and to roll back the duplicate storage system to a previous point in time;

LOGICAL UNIT—a logical entity provided by a storage system for accessing data from the storage system. The logical disk may be a physical logical unit or a virtual logical unit;

LUN—a logical unit number for identifying a logical unit;

PHYSICAL LOGICAL UNIT—a physical entity, such as a disk or an array of disks, for storing data in storage locations that can be accessed by address;

PRODUCTION SITE—a facility where one or more host computers run data processing applications that write data to a storage system and read data from the storage system;

REMOTE ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS—an acknowledgement from remote DPA to the local DPA that data arrived at the remote DPA (either to the appliance or the journal)

SPLITTER ACKNOWLEDGEMENT—an acknowledgement from a DPA to the protection agent (splitter) that data has been received at the DPA; this may be achieved by an SCSI status command.

SAN—a storage area network of nodes that send and receive an I/O and other requests, each node in the network being an initiator or a target, or both an initiator and a target;

SOURCE SIDE—a transmitter of data within a data replication workflow, during normal operation a production site is the source side; and during data recovery a backup site is the source side, sometimes called a primary side;

STORAGE SYSTEM—a SAN entity that provides multiple logical units for access by multiple SAN initiators

TARGET—a node in a SAN that replies to I/O requests;

TARGET SIDE—a receiver of data within a data replication workflow; during normal operation, a back site is the target side, and during data recovery a production site is the target side, sometimes called a secondary side;

VIRTUAL LOGICAL UNIT—a virtual storage entity which is treated as a logical unit by virtual machines;

WAN—a wide area network that connects local networks and enables them to communicate with one another, such as the Internet.

A description of journaling and some techniques associated with journaling may be described in the patent titled “METHODS AND APPARATUS FOR OPTIMAL JOURNALING FOR CONTINUOUS DATA REPLICATION” and with U.S. Pat. No. 7,516,287, which is hereby incorporated by reference.

An Example of a Replication System Used with a Continuous Replication Mode (FIGS. 1 and 2)

Referring to FIG. 1, a data protection system 100 includes two sites; Site I, which is a production site, and Site II, which is a backup site or replica site. Under normal operation the production site is the source side of system 100, and the backup site is the target side of the system. The backup site is responsible for replicating production site data. Additionally, the backup site enables roll back of Site I data to an earlier pointing time, which may be used in the event of data corruption of a disaster, or alternatively in order to view or to access data from an earlier point in time.

FIG. 1 is an overview of a system for data replication of either physical or virtual logical units. Thus, one of ordinary skill in the art would appreciate that in a virtual environment a hypervisor, in one example, would consume logical units and generate a distributed file system on them such as VMFS creates files in the file system and expose the files as logical units to the virtual machines (each VMDK is seen as a SCSI device by virtual hosts). In another example, the hypervisor consumes a network based file system and exposes files in the NFS as SCSI devices to virtual hosts.

During normal operations, the direction of replicate data flow goes from source side to target side. It is possible, however, for a user to reverse the direction of replicate data flow, in which case Site I starts to behave as a target backup site; and Site II starts to behave as a source production site. Such change of replication direction is referred to as a “failover”. A failover may be performed in the event of a disaster at the production site, or for other reasons. In some data architectures, Site I or Site II behaves as a production site for a portion of stored data, and behaves simultaneously as a backup site for another portion of stored data. In some data architectures, a portion of stored data is replicated to a backup site, and another portion is not.

The production site and the backup site may be remote from one another, or they may both be situated at a common site, local to one another. Local data protection has the advantage of minimizing data lag between target and source, and remote data protection has the advantage is being robust in the event that a disaster occurs at the source side.

The source and target sides communicate via a wide area network (WAN) 128, although other types of networks may be used.

Each side of system 100 includes three major components coupled via a storage area network (SAN); namely, (i) a storage system, (ii) a host computer, and (iii) a data protection appliance (DPA). Specifically with reference to FIG. 1, the source side SAN includes a source host computer 104, a source storage system 108, and a source DPA 112. Similarly, the target side SAN includes a target host computer 116, a target storage system 120, and a target DPA 124. As well, the protection agent (sometimes referred to as a splitter) may run on the host, or on the storage, or in the network or at a hypervisor level, and that DPAs are optional and DPA code may run on the storage array too, or the DPA 124 may run as a virtual machine.

Generally, a SAN includes one or more devices, referred to as “nodes”. A node in a SAN may be an “initiator” or a “target”, or both. An initiator node is a device that is able to initiate requests to one or more other devices; and a target node is a device that is able to reply to requests, such as SCSI commands, sent by an initiator node. A SAN may also include network switches, such as fiber channel switches. The communication links between each host computer and its corresponding storage system may be any appropriate medium suitable for data transfer, such as fiber communication channel links.

The host communicates with its corresponding storage system using small computer system interface (SCSI) commands.

System 100 includes source storage system 108 and target storage system 120. Each storage system includes physical storage units for storing data, such as disks or arrays of disks. Typically, storage systems 108 and 120 are target nodes. In order to enable initiators to send requests to storage system 108, storage system 108 exposes one or more logical units (LU) to which commands are issued. Thus, storage systems 108 and 120 are SAN entities that provide multiple logical units for access by multiple SAN initiators.

Logical units are a logical entity provided by a storage system, for accessing data stored in the storage system. The logical unit may be a physical logical unit or a virtual logical unit. A logical unit is identified by a unique logical unit number (LUN). Storage system 108 exposes a logical unit 136, designated as LU A, and storage system 120 exposes a logical unit 156, designated as LU B.

LU B is used for replicating LU A. As such, LU B is generated as a copy of LU A. In one embodiment, LU B is configured so that its size is identical to the size of LU A. Thus, for LU A, storage system 120 serves as a backup for source side storage system 108. Alternatively, as mentioned hereinabove, some logical units of storage system 120 may be used to back up logical units of storage system 108, and other logical units of storage system 120 may be used for other purposes. Moreover, there is symmetric replication whereby some logical units of storage system 108 are used for replicating logical units of storage system 120, and other logical units of storage system 120 are used for replicating other logical units of storage system 108.

System 100 includes a source side host computer 104 and a target side host computer 116. A host computer may be one computer, or a plurality of computers, or a network of distributed computers, each computer may include inter alia a conventional CPU, volatile and non-volatile memory, a data bus, an I/O interface, a display interface and a network interface. Generally a host computer runs at least one data processing application, such as a database application and an e-mail server.

Generally, an operating system of a host computer creates a host device for each logical unit exposed by a storage system in the host computer SAN. A host device is a logical entity in a host computer, through which a host computer may access a logical unit. Host device 104 identifies LU A and generates a corresponding host device 140, designated as Device A, through which it can access LU A. Similarly, host computer 116 identifies LU B and generates a corresponding device 160, designated as Device B.

In the course of continuous operation, host computer 104 is a SAN initiator that issues I/O requests (write/read operations) through host device 140 to LU A using, for example, SCSI commands. Such requests are generally transmitted to LU A with an address that includes a specific device identifier, an offset within the device, and a data size. Offsets are generally aligned to 512 byte blocks. The average size of a write operation issued by host computer 104 may be, for example, 10 kilobytes (KB); i.e., 20 blocks. For an I/O rate of 50 megabytes (MB) per second, this corresponds to approximately 5,000 write transactions per second.

System 100 includes two data protection appliances, a source side DPA 112 and a target side DPA 124. A DPA performs various data protection services, such as data replication of a storage system, and journaling of I/O requests issued by a host computer to source side storage system data. As explained in detail herein, when acting as a target side DPA, a DPA may also enable roll back of data to an earlier point in time, and processing of rolled back data at the target site. Each DPA 112 and 124 is a computer that includes inter alia one or more conventional CPUs and internal memory.

For additional safety precaution, each DPA is a cluster of such computers. Use of a cluster ensures that if a DPA computer is down, then the DPA functionality switches over to another computer. The DPA computers within a DPA cluster communicate with one another using at least one communication link suitable for data transfer via fiber channel or IP based protocols, or such other transfer protocol. One computer from the DPA cluster serves as the DPA leader. The DPA cluster leader coordinates between the computers in the cluster, and may also perform other tasks that require coordination between the computers, such as load balancing.

In the architecture illustrated in FIG. 1, DPA 112 and DPA 124 are standalone devices integrated within a SAN. Alternatively, each of DPA 112 and DPA 124 may be integrated into storage system 108 and storage system 120, respectively, or integrated into host computer 104 and host computer 116, respectively. Both DPAs communicate with their respective host computers through communication lines such as fiber channels using, for example, SCSI commands or any other protocol.

DPAs 112 and 124 are configured to act as initiators in the SAN; i.e., they can issue I/O requests using, for example, SCSI commands, to access logical units on their respective storage systems. DPA 112 and DPA 124 are also configured with the necessary functionality to act as targets; i.e., to reply to I/O requests, such as SCSI commands, issued by other initiators in the SAN, including inter alia their respective host computers 104 and 116. Being target nodes, DPA 112 and DPA 124 may dynamically expose or remove one or more logical units.

As described hereinabove, Site I and Site II may each behave simultaneously as a production site and a backup site for different logical units. As such, DPA 112 and DPA 124 may each behave as a source DPA for some logical units, and as a target DPA for other logical units, at the same time.

Host computer 104 and host computer 116 include protection agents 144 and 164, respectively. Protection agents 144 and 164 intercept SCSI commands issued by their respective host computers, via host devices to logical units that are accessible to the host computers. A data protection agent may act on an intercepted SCSI commands issued to a logical unit, in one of the following ways: send the SCSI commands to its intended logical unit; redirect the SCSI command to another logical unit; split the SCSI command by sending it first to the respective DPA; after the DPA returns an acknowledgement, send the SCSI command to its intended logical unit; fail a SCSI command by returning an error return code; and delay a SCSI command by not returning an acknowledgement to the respective host computer.

A protection agent may handle different SCSI commands, differently, according to the type of the command. For example, a SCSI command inquiring about the size of a certain logical unit may be sent directly to that logical unit, while a SCSI write command may be split and sent first to a DPA associated with the agent. A protection agent may also change its behavior for handling SCSI commands, for example as a result of an instruction received from the DPA.

Specifically, the behavior of a protection agent for a certain host device generally corresponds to the behavior of its associated DPA with, respect to the logical unit of the host device. When a DPA behaves as a source site DPA for a certain logical unit, then during normal course of operation, the associated protection agent splits I/O requests issued by a host computer to the host device corresponding to that logical unit. Similarly, when a DPA behaves as a target device for a certain logical unit, then during normal course of operation, the associated protection agent fails I/O requests issued by host computer to the host device corresponding to that logical unit.

Communication between protection agents and their respective DPAs may use any protocol suitable for data transfer within a SAN, such as fiber channel, or SCSI over fiber channel. The communication may be direct, or via a logical unit exposed by the DPA. Protection agents communicate with their respective DPAs by sending SCSI commands over fiber channel.

Protection agents 144 and 164 are drivers located in their respective host computers 104 and 116. Alternatively, a protection agent may also be located in a fiber channel switch, or in any other device situated in a data path between a host computer and a storage system or on the storage system itself. In a virtualized environment, the protection agent may run at the hypervisor layer or in a virtual machine providing a virtualization layer.

What follows is a detailed description of system behavior tinder normal production mode, and under recovery mode.

In production mode DPA 112 acts as a source site DPA for LU A. Thus, protection agent 144 is configured to act as a source side protection agent; i.e., as a splitter for host device A. Specifically, protection agent 144 replicates SCSI I/O write requests. A replicated SCSI I/O write request is sent to DPA 112. After receiving an acknowledgement from DPA 124, protection agent 144 then sends the SCSI I/O write request to LU A. After receiving a second acknowledgement from storage system 108 host computer 104 acknowledges that an I/O command complete.

When DPA 112 receives a replicated SCSI write request from data protection agent 144, DPA 112 transmits certain I/O information characterizing the write request, packaged as a “write transaction”, over WAN 128 to DPA 124 on the target side, for journaling and for incorporation within target storage system 120.

DPA 112 may send its write transactions to DPA 124 using a variety of modes of transmission, including inter alia (i) a synchronous mode, (ii) an asynchronous mode, and (iii) a snapshot mode. In synchronous mode, DPA 112 sends each write transaction to DPA 124, receives back an acknowledgement from DPA 124, and in turns sends an acknowledgement back to protection agent 144. Protection agent 144 waits until receipt of such acknowledgement before sending the SCSI write request to LU A.

In asynchronous mode, DPA 112 sends an acknowledgement to protection agent 144 upon receipt of each I/O request, before receiving an acknowledgement back from DPA 124.

In snapshot mode, DPA 112 receives several I/O requests and combines them into an aggregate “snapshot” of all write activity performed in the multiple I/O requests, and sends the snapshot to DPA 124, for journaling and for incorporation in target storage system 120. In snapshot mode DPA 112 also sends an acknowledgement to protection agent 144 upon receipt of each I/O request, before receiving an acknowledgement back from DPA 124.

For the sake of clarity, the ensuing discussion assumes that information is transmitted at write-by-write granularity.

While in production mode, DPA 124 receives replicated data of LU A from DPA 112, and performs journaling and writing to storage system 120. When applying write operations to storage system 120, DPA 124 acts as an initiator, and sends SCSI commands to LU B.

During a recovery mode, DPA 124 undoes the write transactions in the journal, so as to restore storage system 120 to the state it was at, at an earlier time.

As described hereinabove, LU B is used as a backup of LU A. As such, during normal production mode, while data written to LU A by host computer 104 is replicated from LU A to LU B, host computer 116 should not be sending I/O requests to LU B. To prevent such I/O requests from being sent, protection agent 164 acts as a target site protection agent for host Device B and fails I/O requests sent from host computer 116 to LU B through host Device B.

Target storage system 120 exposes a logical unit 176, referred to as a “journal LU”, for maintaining a history of write transactions made to LU B, referred to as a “journal”. Alternatively, journal LU 176 may be striped over several logical units, or may reside within all of or a portion of another logical unit. DPA 124 includes a journal processor 180 for managing the journal.

Journal processor 180 functions generally to manage the journal entries of LU B. Specifically, journal processor 180 enters write transactions received by DPA 124 from DPA 112 into the journal, by writing them into the journal LU, reads the undo information for the transaction from LU B. updates the journal entries in the journal LU with undo information, applies the journal transactions to LU B, and removes already-applied transactions from the journal.

Referring to FIG. 2, which is an illustration of a write transaction 200 for a journal. The journal may be used to provide an adaptor for access to storage 120 at the state it was in at any specified point in time. Since the journal contains the “undo” information necessary to roll back storage system. 120, data that was stored in specific memory locations at the specified point in time may be obtained by undoing write transactions that occurred subsequent to such point in time.

Write transaction 200 generally includes the following fields: one or more identifiers; a time stamp, which is the date & time at which the transaction was received by source side DPA 1.12; a write size, which is the size of the data block; a location in journal LU 176 where the data is entered; a location in LU B where the data is to be written; and the data itself.

Write transaction 200 is transmitted from source side DPA 112 to target side DPA 124. As shown in FIG. 2, DPA 124 records the write transaction 200 in the journal that includes four streams. A first stream, referred to as a DO stream, includes new data for writing in LU B. A second stream, referred to as an DO METADATA stream, includes metadata for the write transaction, such as an identifier, a date & time, a write size, a beginning address in LU B for writing the new data in, and a pointer to the offset in the DO stream where the corresponding data is located. Similarly, a third stream, referred to as an UNDO stream, includes old data that was overwritten in LU B; and a fourth stream, referred to as an UNDO METADATA, include an identifier, a date & time, a write size, a beginning address in LU B where data was to be overwritten, and a pointer to the offset in the UNDO stream where the corresponding old data is located.

In practice each of the four streams holds a plurality of write transaction data. As write transactions are received dynamically by target DPA, 124, they are recorded at the end of the DO stream and the end of the DO METADATA stream, prior to committing the transaction. During transaction application, when the various write transactions are applied to LU B, prior to writing the new DO data into addresses within the storage system, the older data currently located in such addresses is recorded into the UNDO stream. In some examples, the metadata stream (e.g., UNDO METADATA stream or the DO METADATA stream) and the data stream (e.g., UNDO stream or DO stream) may be kept in a single stream each (i.e., one UNDO data and UNDO METADATA stream and one DO data and DO METADATA stream) by interleaving the metadata into the data stream.

Referring to FIG. 3, a data protection system 300 includes hosts 301, a data protection appliance (DPA) cluster 302 a and a storage array 306 a at a production site and a DPA cluster 302 b and a storage array 306 b at a replication site. The DPA clusters 302 a, 302 b are connected by a network 304 (e.g., a WAN, a Fibre Channel and so forth).

The storage array 306 b includes a replica storage volume 312 b which is a replica of the primary storage volume 312 a, a journal 316 b and a delta marking stream 360 b. In other example, the delta marking stream 360 b may also reside in the memory or internal storage of the DPA 302 b.

The storage array 306 a includes a primary storage volume 312 a, a delta marking stream 360 a, a node 372 a and a node 372 b. The node 372 a includes a data protection agent 380 a and a cache 376 a and the node 372 b includes a data protection agent 380 b and a cache 376 b. The node 372 b is a backup to the node 372 a in case it fails. The cache 376 b is used to mirror data in the cache 372 a. The delta marking stream 360 a may also reside in an internal disk on the DPA 302 a, but may also be configured as a volume inside the storage array which is configured in a non-write cache mode. Thus, cache loss and power loss may not cause data loss to the delta marking stream, since the write I/Os to such a stream are sequential and have a very low bandwidth. This has no effect on performance.

The DPA cluster 302 a includes a replication processor 222 used to enable recovery of data in the primary storage volume 312 a on the storage array 306 a in the event of total loss of cache data. The replication processor 322 is able to ascertain the replica storage volume 312 h, representing a point-in-time copy of the source device at a given time T; from the journal 316, UNDO information for all the write I/Os that were committed to the primary storage volume 312 a from the beginning of the journal 316 until time T; and from the journal 316, DO information for all the writes I/Os that were committed to the primary storage volume 312 a after time T and were not applied to the replica storage volume yet.

The write I/Os sent by the hosts 301 are not immediately saved to the spindles or drive which contain the volume data because each host write to the primary storage volume 312 a consumes significant bandwidth and processing time. Rather, each write I/O is first saved to the cache 376 a, which is mirrored to cache 376 b (so that a failure of one component will not cause fall loss of the cache.)

because writing to a cache is relatively fast, as it is memory-based and latency when accessing the cache is in orders-of-magnitude better than applying the data directly to the primary storage volume 312 a. In one example, the data in the cache 376 a is marked as “write-pending.” At a later stage a background process running (sometimes called de-staging) on the storage array 306 a copies the data from the cache 376 a to the primary storage volume 312 a for persistent safe-keeping.

The storage array 306 a maintains at any point in time a timestamp, T_(min) that represents the oldest write I/O that is in the cache 376 a in “write-pending” status. Meaning, any write I/O that occurred prior to is already on the primary storage volume 312 a. Write I/Os that are newer than T_(min) may or may not have been committed to primary storage volume 312 a because there may be priority mechanisms for de-staging write I/Os from the cache 376 a, where newer write I/Os to high-priority devices (e.g., other volumes in the storage array 306 a not shown in FIG. 3) are de-staged before older write I/Os to low-priority devices (e.g., other volumes in the storage array 306 a not shown in FIG. 3). Or because the de-staging process prefers writing sequential writes and thus writes which are sequential may be de-staged earlier. The storage cache may have a global T_(min) or keep a separate T_(min) per device.

Referring to FIG. 4, an example of a process to handle write I/Os is a process 400. Process 400 prepares the system 300 in the event there is total cache loss to recover storage to a consistent state without a need for full rebuild of all the devices.

Process 400 receives write I/Os at the storage array (402). For example, write I/Os are received from the host 301 to write data to the primary storage volume 312 a. The write I/Os are sent from the host 301 (using an application (not shown)) to the storage array 372 a. Once the writes are intercepted at the storage array, process 400 splits the write I/O to a DPA (406). For example, the data protection agent 380 a at the node 372 a splits the write I/Os (i.e., the write I/Os are sent to the DPA 302 a as well as to the cache 376).

Process 400 mirrors the write I/O in cache (408). For example, the write I/O is stored at the cache 376 a and is mirrored at the cache 376 b.

Process 400 acknowledges to a host (410). For example, the storage array 306 a acknowledges receipt of the write I/Os to the host 301.

Process 400 periodically de-stages data from the cache to volume (422). For example, the data in the cache 376 a is moved (or copied) to the primary storage volume 312 a and removed from the cache 376 a.

Process 400 notifies DPA of current time and a time of oldest entry in cache (430). The storage array 306 a notifies the replication processor 322 of the DPA 302 a of a current time, T_(Now), and a time, T_(min) that represents the oldest write I/O that is in the cache 376 a in “write-pending” stains, which also indicates about the last time the cache 376 a was emptied or flushed.

Process 400 adjusts the time of the oldest entry from the cache in storage array time to replication processor time (432). For example, the replication processor 322 will use the times, T_(Now) and T_(min), to correlate them to its own time because times may differ between the storage array 306 a and the replication processor 322, and will create a timestamp, T_(RepMin), which represents the oldest write I/O in the cache 376 a in the replication processor time.

Process 400 adds time of oldest entry from cache in replication processor time to replica journal (436). For example, the replication processor 322 adds the time of the oldest entry from cache in replication processor time, T_(RepMin), to the journal 316 b.

Referring to FIG. 5, an example of a process to recover I/O data after a cache failure is a process 500.

Process 500 flushes all pending data to the replica site (502), (i.e., if replication in asynchronous mode all data still pending between the production and replica site is flushed to the replica DO stream).

Process 500 apply DO stream to replica volume (504). For example, the DO stream in the journal 316 is applied to the replica volume.

Process 500 determines time of oldest entry from cache in replication processor time from journal (506). For example, the replication processor 322 reads the time of the oldest entry in the cache 376 a in replication processor time from the journal 316.

Process 500 generates a delta marking stream of differences between the replica volume and the storage array (508). For example, for any write I/O that exists in the journal 316 after the time of the oldest entry from cache in replication processor time, T_(RepMin), the I/O location and length are retrieved and added to the delta marker stream 360 b at the replica site.

If replication was down during processing block 502 the data from production delta marker stream 360 a is added to the replica delta marker stream 360 b (510).

The delta marker stream 360 b now includes all the locations suspected as being lost during the cache loss, i.e. all locations suspected as different between replica site and production site.

Process 500 start replication from replica site to production site to recover the production site (516). For example, the delta marking stream 360 b is applied by the replication processor 322 to the primary storage volume 312 a.

Using this mechanism, the storage array will be re-constructed to reflect its latest state as known by the replication processor. The mechanism is also efficient in a sense that data on the storage array that was already committed to the back-end media does not need to be re-applied to the storage array.

This approach will allow the storage array to successfully and quickly recover from cache-loss scenarios. The amount of data lost depends on the replication processor RPO measurement. If the replication processor is performing sync-replication, then RPO is zero, hence no data loss will happen.

Referring to FIG. 6, in one example, a computer 600 includes a processor 602, a volatile memory 604, a non-volatile memory 606 (e.g., hard disk) and the user interface (UI) 608 (e.g., a graphical user interface, a mouse, a keyboard, a display, touch screen and so forth). The non-volatile memory 606 stores computer instructions 612, an operating system 616 and data 618. In one example, the computer instructions 612 are executed by the processor 602 out of volatile memory 604 to perform all or part of the processes described herein (e.g., processes 400 and 500).

The processes described herein (e.g., processes 700, 800 and 900) are not limited to use with the hardware and software of FIG. 6; they may find applicability in any computing or processing environment and with any type of machine or set of machines that is capable of running a computer program. The processes described herein may be implemented in hardware, software, or a combination of the two. The processes described herein may be implemented in computer programs executed on programmable computers/machines that each includes a processor, a non-transitory machine-readable medium or other article of manufacture that is readable by the processor (including volatile and non-volatile memory and/or storage elements), at least one input device, and one or more output devices. Program code may be applied to data entered using an input device to perform any of the processes described herein and to generate output information.

The system may be implemented, at least in part, via a computer program product, (e.g., in a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium such as, for example, a norm transitory computer-readable medium), for execution by, or to control the operation of data processing apparatus (e.g., a programmable processor, a computer, or multiple computers)). Each such program may be implemented in a high level procedural or object-oriented programming language to communicate with a computer system. However, the programs may be implemented in assembly or machine language. The language may be a compiled or an interpreted language and it may be deployed in any form, including as a stand-alone program or as a module, component, subroutine, or other unit suitable for use in a computing environment. A computer program may be deployed to be executed on one computer or on multiple computers at one site or distributed across multiple sites and interconnected by a communication network. A computer program may be stored on a non-transitory machine-readable medium that is readable by a general or special purpose program able computer for configuring and operating the computer when the non-transitory machine-readable medium is read by the computer to perform the processes described herein. For example, the processes described herein may also be implemented as a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium, configured with a computer program, where upon execution, instructions in the computer program cause the computer to operate in accordance with the processes. A non-transitory machine-readable medium may include but is not limited to a hard drive, compact disc, flash memory, non-volatile memory, volatile memory, magnetic diskette and so forth but does not include a transitory signal per se.

The processes described herein are not limited to the specific examples described. For example, the processes 700, 800 and 900 are not limited to the specific processing order of FIGS. 7 to 9, respectively. Rather, any of the processing blocks of FIG. 7 to 9 may be re-ordered, combined or removed, performed in parallel or in serial, as necessary, to achieve the results set forth above.

In other examples, one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize that increasing and decreasing reference counts may be done opposite as described. For example, the reference count can be decreased and then increased. One of ordinary skill in the art would also recognize that a value is changed from a first state to a second state when the signature data is needed to avoid erasure of the data and when the data is no longer needed the value returns to a first state.

The processing blocks (for example, in the processes 700, 800 and 900) associated with implementing the system may be performed by one or more programmable processors executing one or more computer programs to perform the functions of the system. All or part of the system may be implemented as, special purpose logic circuitry (e.g., an FPGA (field-programmable gate array) and/or an ASIC (application-specific integrated circuit)). All or part of the system may be implemented using electronic hardware circuitry that include electronic devices such as, for example, at least one of a processor, a memory, a programmable logic device or a logic gate.

Elements of different embodiments described herein may be combined to form other embodiments not specifically set forth above. Other embodiments not specifically described herein are also within the scope of the following claims. 

What is claimed is:
 1. A method comprising: receiving write I/Os for storage in a primary storage volume of a storage array; splitting the write I/Os to a replica site; storing the write I/Os for storage in a cache of the storage array; periodically de-staging the write I/Os in the cache to the primary storage volume; after a cache data loss, restoring lost write I/Os from the cache by using the write I/Os split to the replica site; replicating the primary storage volume to form a replica volume; and recording the split write I/Os in a journal comprising a DO stream of writes I/Os not applied to the replica volume, wherein restoring the lost write I/Os comprises: applying the DO stream to the replica volume; generating a first delta marking stream of differences between the replica volume and the primary storage volume; and applying data matching dirty locations in the first delta marking stream to the primary storage volume.
 2. The method of claim 1 wherein generating the first delta marking stream comprises using journal entries from and after a time of the oldest entry not flushed from the cache.
 3. The method of claim 2, further comprising receiving from the storage array a current time and the time of the oldest entry in the cache.
 4. The method of claim 1, further comprising flushing pending data to the DO stream.
 5. The method of claim 1, further comprising adding data from a second delta marking stream at a production site to the first delta marking stream if replication was down during the cache data loss.
 6. An apparatus comprising: electronic hardware circuitry configured to: receive write I/Os for storage in a primary storage volume of a storage array; split the write I/Os to a replica site; store the write I/Os for storage in a cache of the storage array; periodically de-stage the write I/Os from the cache to the primary storage volume; after a cache data loss, restore lost write I/Os from the cache by using the write I/Os split to the replica site; replicate the primary storage volume to form a replica volume; and record the split write I/Os in a journal comprising a DO stream of writes I/Os not applied to the replica volume, wherein the circuitry comprises at least one of a processor, a memory, a programmable logic device or a logic gate, wherein the circuitry configured to restore the lost write I/Os comprises circuitry configured to: apply the DO stream to the replica volume; generate a first delta marking stream of differences between the replica volume and the primary storage volume; and apply data matching dirty locations in the first delta marking stream to the primary storage volume.
 7. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein the circuitry configured to generate the first delta marking stream comprises circuitry configured to use journal entries from and after a time of the oldest entry not flushed from the cache.
 8. The apparatus of claim 7, further comprising circuitry configured to receive from the storage array a current time and a time of the oldest entry in the cache.
 9. The apparatus of claim 6, further comprising circuitry configured to flush pending data to the DO stream.
 10. The apparatus of claim 6, further comprising circuitry configured to add data from a second delta marking stream at a production site to the first delta marking stream if replication was down during the cache data loss.
 11. An article comprising: a non-transitory computer-readable medium that stores computer-executable instructions, the instructions causing a machine to: receive write I/Os for storage in a primary storage volume of a storage array; split the write I/Os to a replica site; store the write I/Os for storage in a cache of the storage array; periodically de-stage the write I/Os from the cache to the primary storage volume; after a cache data loss, restore lost write I/Os from the cache by using the write I/Os split to the replica site; replicate the primary storage volume to form a replica volume; and record the split write I/Os in a journal comprising a DO stream of writes I/Os not applied to the replica volume, wherein the instructions causing the machine to restore the lost write I/Os comprises instructions causing the machine to: apply the DO stream to the replica volume; generate a first delta marking stream of differences between the replica volume and the primary storage volume; and apply data matching dirty locations in the first delta marking stream to the primary storage volume.
 12. The article of claim 11, wherein the instructions causing the machine to generate the first delta marking stream comprises instructions causing the machine to use journal entries from and after a time of the oldest entry not flushed from the cache, and further comprising instructions causing the machine to receive from the storage array a current time and a time of the oldest entry in the cache.
 13. The article of claim 11, further comprising instructions causing the machine to flush pending data to the DO stream.
 14. The article of claim 11, further comprising instructions causing the machine to add data from a second delta marking stream at a production site to the first delta marking stream if replication was down during the cache data loss. 